Thursday, October 30, 2008

Now that all my october shows are installed I can take a breathe (phew) and play Mom for awhile ~ which at this time of the year means carving pumpkins!!! The past few years I have carved a dress in a pumpkin - but this year I felt like taking a year off (call it dress overdose) ... I was just going to help my girls carve theirs. But like so many times the dress would not be ignored! As my girls and I were pulling the guts from their pumpkins I noticed a difference ~ each girl's pumpkin's inners had a different consistency and color! So I started playing with the goo and this is what I got!!

For a call to art from the Brickbottom Art Association that I am working on I have been deep into Greek Mythology, so when I was thinking of a name for this dress - Persephone came to mind. Besides being Hades' wife she is the goddess of the harvest and the embodiment of the Earth's fertility. It seemed an appropriate name for a dress made of pumpkin guts and many seeds. So here is Persephone's frock. Happy carving & peace

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Here is a video of one of the newer dresses that is exhibited in the Dana Hall show. This dress has been in the works for over a year. The first version was made of just skewers and masking tape and it was very strong,however ... I got greedy and wanted to have the bottom spread out. By doing that I screwed with the physics of the dress and the entire structure collapsed. When I was trying to reconstruct it a friend and fellow artist, David Lang, told me how to make really strong joints using wire, crazy glue and baking soda. So I wired each joint, did my little magic with the crazy glue and baking soda and then for the aesthetics I have wrapped all the joints with masking tape. The people climbing on it are also made out of masking tape.

With naming my pieces I try to stay pretty generic as to let the audience create their own experience about the piece. So this dress is Skewer Dress. However ever since its first creation it has been referred to as treacherous – because it is!!! If you get too close to the dress it will jump out and snag you!!

For the Dana show I have displayed the dress on a piece of broken mirror which is hovering above the ground. All adding to the illusion. peace!!

Saturday, October 18, 2008

New England is famous for its spectacular fall colors and this fall has been amazingly beautiful! So even though this month has been a bit of a crazy for me I had to stop and make a dress.

It started as I was running some errands in downtown Natick and I came across these stunning red maple leaves with these distinct yellow veins. I couldn’t pass them up! So I gathered them up to make a red dress. I asked my oldest to help me collect some more red leaves and she became enamored with these striking yellow leaves. To compliment the palette I added the spectacular red leaves of the burning bush. As the dress emerged it felt like a flirty party dress so I kept it strapless.

In creating this dress, I realized one of the delights of the Dress Project for me is having a vehicle with which I can highlight different details of everyday life that maybe overlooked. I can draw attention to the beauty of the fall foliage or the exquisiteness of VCR tape or the elegance of broken eggshells. Some of these details will be on display at the show at the Dana Hall School, Wellesley. The opening of that show is this Tuesday, Oct. 21st, 5:00-7:30. More details below or on Dana Hall's web page. Peace!